Avery Edison, 25, is a comedian by profession but being put in an all-male jail was no joke for the transgender woman from the U.K. She was transferred to a women’s jail Tuesday night.

Avery Edison, a transgender woman from the U.K. who was stopped by customs at Pearson airport for overstaying her previous visit, was detained for a day in a men’s jail before being transferred to a women’s facility.

A transgender woman from the U.K. who was stopped by customs at Pearson airport for overstaying her previous visit was detained for a day in a men’s jail before being transferred to a women’s facility.

Avery Edison, 25, who is identified legally in her British IDs and passport as female, was sent to Milton’s Maplehurst Correctional Complex, a facility for high-risk, violent inmates.

After considerable traffic on social media and the intervention of a lawyer, she was transferred Tuesday evening to the Vanier Centre for Women in Milton.

Edison was intercepted by the Canada Border Services Agency upon her arrival from Heathrow on Monday when officials flagged her for previously staying behind in Canada after her student visa expired.

A comedian who has performed at Yuk Yuk’s and Comedy Bar in Toronto, Edison came to Canada in 2010 to study comedy writing at Humber College. She did not finish the program and only left Canada last September, months after her visa expired.

She returned Monday to visit her girlfriend of two years, Romy Sugden, and planned to leave on March 3.

While being held in the customs interview room at Pearson on Monday, Edison documented her encounter and treatment on Twitter, which attracted tens of thousands of new followers overnight.

Edison and many others wondered why she was being held in a male facility.

“Even if I should be put in prison, I’m a woman and I should be in a women’s prison,” a drained Edison told the Star earlier Tuesday through a glass barrier at Maplehurst.

“It sucks. Other inmates are banging in their cells and yelling all the time. I’m scared,” said Edison, who has been placed in a solitary cell. “Even the guards here don’t know why I’m here.”

Edison said she was offered the choice of taking the next flight back to London or being detained for an inadmissibility hearing. She opted for detention because she and Sugden do not have the money for the fare on a whim. She said she did not expect to end up in a jail for men.

Edison said she wasn’t aware of the dire consequences she faced for overstaying Canada’s welcome. In an earlier tweet, a gleeful Edison wrote, “Wet cell is a fantastic term, by the way. Really lets the imagination run wild. This should all make for some good standup, eh?”

But as her detention became real, she posted: “This is 100 per cent my fault, but it still sucks. I feel so helpless and trapped.”

Edison’s lawyer, Adrienne Smith, said she was shocked when Sugden contacted her to get her girlfriend transferred. Both Edison and Sugden had been asking corrections officials to do the same.

“I said, ‘This can’t be true,’ ” said Smith. “Why would they put someone who is legally a female in her passport and all IDs into a male facility?”

When Smith contacted the Correctional Services ministry, she said she was asked if Edison had breasts and male genitalia based on a clinical checklist.

A ministry spokesperson declined to comment on Edison’s case but said officials are reviewing the situation and are in communication with the border agency regarding the status of “the individual.”

“Anyone with concerns about their treatment or care while in our custody can bring those concerns forward to the staff, superintendent of an institution, ministry officials, including the minister and deputy minister,” said Greg Flood.

“Classification recommendations and decisions are made on a case-by-case basis and are based on factual information and objective criteria.”

While border officials decide if an immigration detention is warranted, the federal agency said it is up to provincial correctional services where to detain an inmate.

“We are committed to ensuring the fair treatment of all travellers and that the criteria and indicators used by our officers do not discriminate on grounds protected by the Canadian Human Rights Act,” said Canada Border Services Agency spokeswoman Anna Pape.

“When an individual is detained in a provincial corrections facility, the CBSA asks its provincial service providers, where possible, to avoid commingling those detained for immigration purposes with those who are in custody for criminal reasons.”

The fact that Edison was placed in solitary was little comfort to her girlfriend.

“The law really hasn’t caught up with the reality of the LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender) movement. Avery is legally female. Whether she has female genitals should not be a factor,” Sugden said earlier. “It just adds insult to injury that they have put her in a male prison.”

Edison is expected to have her detention review on Wednesday morning.

Syed Hussan of No One Is Illegal, a grassroots advocacy group for migrants, said border officials at Pearson Airport are more likely to detain foreign nationals than their counterparts in Atlantic, Prairie and Pacific regions.

“Foreign nationals receive different treatment, under similar conditions, depending on where they arrive at a Canadian port of entry. It is at the CBSA officer’s discretion whether to continue to detain or to release a person pending their first detention review,” he said.

“Immigration enforcement has unchecked powers and no oversight allowing arbitrary detentions like Avery’s to occur.”

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